Tarantino’s ‘Once Upon a Time in Hollywood’ Gets a New, Less Controversial Release Date

Quentin Tarantino‘s Manson Family movie was set to open on quite a controversial date: the 50th anniversary of Sharon Tate’s murder. Now that’s changed, but only by a little.

Once Upon a Time in Hollywood, Tarantino’s dive into 1960s Hollywood and the crimes of Charles Manson’s followers, was originally set for an August 9, 2019, 50 years after the horrendous murders at the home on Cielo Drive. Now the film will arrive two weeks earlier, on July 26 of next year. As Varietynotes, the new release is possibly an attempt to avoid further controversy around the project, which Tate’s family has publicly slammed, but Sony didn’t give any reason for the change.

The film will take a pretty fictionalized approach to the Manson murders – I mean, this is a Tarantino movie – following Leonardo DiCaprio as a former TV star and his stunt double, played by Brad Pitt in Robert Redford cosplay. Margot Robbie will play Tate, Damian Lewis is Steve McQueen, and the rest of the stacked cast includes Burt Reynolds, Al Pacino, Tim Roth, Zoe Bell, Michael Madsen, Timothy Olyphant, Luke Perry, Dakota Fanning, Emile Hirsch, and Clifton Collins Jr.

Here’s the official synopsis:

The two lead characters are Rick Dalton (DiCaprio), former star of a western TV series, and his longtime stunt double Clint Booth (Pitt). Both are struggling to make it in a Hollywood they don’t recognize anymore. But Rick has a very famous next-door neighbor…Sharon Tate.

Sony also made a few other changes and additions to their release schedule. Zombieland 2 will officially arrive on October 11, 2019, Greta Gerwig‘s Little Women adaptation with the best cast ever will finally be in your eyeballs next Christmas, and Vin Diesel‘s Bloodshot is set for February 21, 2020. This summer’s releases have changed a bit too, with the Slender Man movie pushed up to August 10, and Sundance favorite Searching starring John Cho now arriving August 24.